Modest Mouse: Good News For People Who Love Bad News

As a side note, I realize that I primarily review albums that are rather old, but I more do it to show what I like and the music that has helped or moved me the most. Enjoy!

This album has been practically a life saver to me. Isaac Brock's introspective lyrics and his jagged guitar get inside of my head and almost allow me to have conversations with myself because the music feels so relevant to real life for me. It is the perfect album to get me out of a slump and also to make me understand how beautiful life is no matter what it dishes out. Lines like "If life's not beautiful with all the pain, I'd rather never ever see beauty again," and "If it takes shit to make bliss, well I'm living pretty blissfully." Both of those lines are from the track titled "The View." He perfectly captures mortality, struggle, pain, and hardship and its place amidst the beauty of living life. As my friend once said, the words feel so good. Amen.

Air: Pocket Symphony

This album is incredible. Air is one of my top listened to artists and I only listen to this album. I plan on moving on, but it's so good that the other album I have (Moon Safari) just gets ignored. Pocket Symphony is just that. It's like a little orchestra of uplifting, stop you dead in your tracks beauty that unfolds from the pocket of just two people. The lyrical qualities travel well with the perfectly timed transitions and strange yet melodious sounds that emanate from their instruments. Wonderfully complex and composed of sounds that fill my bones and shake my soul, it is one of the best waking up or going to sleep albums that I have found but can also be enjoyed throughout the day and over and over again.

The name AIR is a backronym for Amour, Imagination, Rêve or love, imagination, dream.


I stongly suggest.

Scene but un-Scene

I consider myself a man of music, not necessarily well versed in all the classics and not necessarily up on all the new sounds that make their way into the world but I feel I have a good basis for appreciation. (Click my picture to hear my frequency). This band "The Dear Hunter," was started by Casey Crescenzo as a side project from his post-hardcore band "The Receiving End of Sirens." It would be categorized as experimental rock and prog rock. His voice has kind of a scene like quality but the instrumentation and the lyrics of the songs vary very much from that type of music. I enjoy the album "ACT 1: The Lake South, The River North" very much and think it's a very worthwhile listen for anyone with their fingers in prog rock, alternative or experimental, as well as those of you scratching at the walls for a better listen than Fall Out Boy, Panic! At The Disco, or Motion City Soundtrack, but with a similiar sound. Enjoy!